Suddenly, activity!
Actual activity for once! Amazing, I know.
With the centrepiece of my V cosplay being the jacket, most of the work has been on that.
Rather than modify an actual leather jacket and worry about having to match materials/colours, I decided to build it up mostly from scratch. The plan is to use a zip-fronted sweatshirt as both the lining for the jacket AND the base for the wiring that'll run between the LEDs and the power supply.
After digging up a PNG of the Samurai band logo, I got it enlarged/printed out as an A2 poster and have cut out all of the various pieces (nearly 60 of them!), ready to be used as templates to cut out of the back.
Add that to 12-volt LED strip lights (red and white for the back and, like a rebel, blue for the collar), powered by 24 AA batteries with coloured plastic office wallets to help diffuse them, and I've got the beginnings of V's jacket.
After that, will come printing (or cutting out with white material) the Samurai text on the back of the covered collar and getting all the patches/badges done!